Our things have finally arrived from the States here to Israel…so glad to have my stuff finally!

I have a spare room that I can use as a studio space but have to share with that little red bed. It belong to the owners and it must stay, so I have to work around it.

I will look for movable drawers to shove under that work table and maybe pegboard if I can attach it securely..the walls are cement..yes they are. We are on the 3rd floor apartment and the walls are some sort of cement. Its great..no neighbor noise.

I’m hoping that I can somehow use that little room off the side there for the torch but of course working with a torch requires a very good ventilation system so that’s not a go yet..it would be an amazing little work space though, don’t you think?

I have to find some glass storage room..my glass rods are in those 3 tupperware containers tucked beside the work table.

On a side note..the glass, kiln and all of our things..tools clothes..some dishes…all travelled 3000 miles from British Columbia, Canada to California, USA, another 3000 from CA to Alabama, then flew 10,000 miles to Beer Sheva, Israel ~and all we lost was a small bowl.

We visited the site of Abraham’s well today..it’s a sacred site to the Jewish people and unlike Canada or the United States where something like this might be given a national monument and historical park recognition, the site that marks Be’er Sheva’s origin is found with great difficulty [it’s located behind a wall] sitting unassumingly beside the local Dominos Pizza joint [ yes! Domino’s. We were surprised too~]

The site of an ancient well that has been preserved for hundreds of years. It’s said to be the well that was dug by Abraham.

Above you can see a replica of a water wheel that would have been used to pump the water.

Be’er Sheva was built on the bank of a wadi which was flooded by rain water in the winter. In the summer the water lay shallow under the ground level. According to archeologists, the site was occupied from the 4th millennium BCE. In 3000 BCE its first peoples moved away and it was only seasonally inhabited by nomads, among these were presumably the Biblical patriarchs – but no archeological traces have been found of them.

Some main stories in the Bible are about Be’er Sheva, beginning with Abraham. He was allowed to settle on the lands of king Avimelek, who ruled the land of Gerar. But they entered a dispute about a well which Abraham used but which had been taken by Avimelek’s servants. Abraham dug a new well at Be’er Sheva and gave Avimelek seven lambs to enforce the oath to be peaceful towards each other. The well was dubbed Be’er Sheva (be’er means ‘well’ and sheva can be interpreted as ‘seven’ or ‘oath.’ – see Genesis 21:22-34).

[So it seems that because of this ancient pact, the word for the number ‘seven’ and ‘oath’ mean one and the same in Israel..I love it.]

Inside we watched a small film that detailed some of Be’er Shevas history. You could purchase maps and small artifacts as well as Jewish kippahs, the skullcap traditionally worn by Jewish men and boys to show their acknowledgment that God watches over us all.